Stop for a moment: Do you know where your house keys are? Where your cell phone is or your wallet? Are they in the same place they normally are? Probably.

We carry our daily “must have” items in the same place all the time because we don’t want to spend a lot of time looking for them if we need them.

The same thing is true for your defensive firearm. If (God forbid) you’ll need it, you’ll need it rightthisverysecond and not want to pause for a moment to reflect where it might be. This is why once you’ve decided on where to carry your pistol, you’ll want to carry in that position as often as possible and not move it to another location or yourself or somewhere else.

I want to thank everyone who answered last week’s poll because it really helped me (and a bunch of other people) become more informed about where to start when recommending on-body carry for women.

Yes, no two women are exactly alike (no two men, either…), so there will always be a need for women (and men) who own guns to try things out for themselves and see what works for them. The difference is now I and a bunch of other people have a place to begin from when it comes to recommending on-body carry for women.

Need some help here recommending an *on-body* location for a CCW pistol as a starting point for women who want to carry. We can have the on-body versus off-body (i.e. purse holsters ,etc) carry discussion on some other day: What I’m interested in is hearing from women who carry a defensive firearm about where they prefer to carry their gun on their person.

I’d like to know (anonymously) where you carry in order to help people like myself and others who occasionally get asked about these thing. It’d help if we have a starting point when it comes to recommending a carry position for their guns, and your input would really help.

Here’s the deal. We have three great holsters for pocket semi-automatics to give away, along with two funny and informative books on concealed carry. From now until midnight Arizona time on Labour Day (or Labor Day to all my non-Canadian friends) each “Like” and “Follow” on either our Twitter feed or Facebook page is one chance to win, and each like or follow on MyGunCulture‘s Twitter feed or Facebook page is another chance to win, so with four clicks of the mouse, you’ll have four chances to win.

And to think people play the lottery instead of following us on Facebook. Our contest doesn’t even require you to spend HOURS scratching off a square on a ticket!

The EZ-Rider II offers more than just off-body carry, though, as it comes with a detachable paddle attachment that allows it to be carried on the belt as well. The holster easily holds my KelTec P3AT and fits my S&W Shield as well. The included magazine pouch is too big for the skinny and short P3AT magazine, but it easily holds double stack magazines that it was made for.

The holster is made from ballistic nylon, with a leather backer and plastic paddle for belt carry, and was surprisingly fast to use. The zipper was easy to grasp and open (although an additional pull would make that task easier) and I found it was fast and easy to get the gun out and into play from the holster.

How fast? Well, let’s compare the time it took to draw and shoot at a target from the EZ-Rider II to a the time needed for a tuckable inside the waistband holster.

Average Time to Draw and fire one shot

SeatedIWB (Tucked): 4.77EZ-Rider II: 3.43

StandingIWB (Tucked): 3.23EZ-Rider II: 3.30

And this is what that looks like in action.

I was pleasantly surprised by this holster. If you’re looking for something different in a holster, or if you’re looking at trying off-body carry and want something that’s fast to access and easy to carry, I’d suggest you give the DeSantis EZ-Rider II a try.

I recently had a chance to try out a few options for off-body carry in the course of writing a recent article on concealed carry for Shooting Illustrated. The testing showed that it was easy to access my gun and quickly engage a target when the gun was stowed in a bag or Day-timer. This came as a bit of surprise to me: I’ve always carried on my belt or in my pocket and up until then, I never really considered off-body carry as a way to way to keep my gun out of sight.

I found out, though, that IF your bag is close by you, can get a gun into action pretty quickly. Not as fast as my daily carry untucked t-shirt, and not fast enough to pass the Federal Air Marshall test, but pretty fast nevertheless.

I’m still going to carry on my person whenever I can because that’s what I’m used to, but now that I know I can draw from a computer case or messenger bag with some degree of speed, I’d look at off-body carry as a way to carry a second gun or a bigger gun if I’m carrying in a pocket, and I’d definitely follow the 3 rules of off-body carry that noted gun writer and TV host Michael Bane laid out in his concealed carry DVD.

If you’re the kind of person who consistently loses their car keys, glasses or other important items, don’t do it.

Once you’ve made the decision to carry off-body, the bag/purse with the gun in has to go with you everywhere.

You have to “Go to the gun” earlier in the encounter than you would with a belt or pocket holster.

Numbers 1 and 2 are unique to off-body carry: If I carry on my belt or in a pocket, that gun stays in its holster all day long, and I know where it is at any given moment, something may or may not be true with a bag or case that I’m carrying, which means you have to know where your bag is every moment of the day, and that includes the restroom, the dinner table, you name it.

And number 3? Well, going to the gun early is just a good idea, no matter how you carry.

Police say a man was shot in the hand after his gun fell out of its holster while he hurried across a parking lot to avoid holding up traffic outside a Pennsylvania Walmart store.

So he was doing the right thing (carrying his sidearm in a holster), but the holster wasn’t up to the basic task of keeping his gun on his person while running across a road.

Chances are, this guy bought a holster because it felt right or looked nice or was comfortable to wear, and unless you’ve taken a serious training class where running around and “stress fire” with your daily carry gear is part of the agenda and sidearm OR competed in USPSA/IDPA with the same kind of rig, you’ll never know if what you have on you is capable of handling physical activity beyond pulling yourself up off the couch.

Practical for concealed carry or practically worthless?

A practical pistol match subjects you AND your equipment to a certain amount of artificial stress. Is it the real thing? No. Is it the closest thing you’ll get to the real thing? Todd Green, Mike Seeklander, Michael Bane and Massad Ayoob say yes, and I believe them. Finding out if your holster of choice keeps your gun safe in a match will spare you the embarrassment and danger of failing to keep it safe on the streets.